


i heard you were looking like the moon

by KilltheRhythm



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Coming of Age, Elements of Mythology, Emre and ous are bffs, Emre's a huge stoner in this, M/M, Magical Realism, Slow Build, Supernatural Elements, marco and Auba as the town's trendy gay couple, teenagers au, title comes from a Richard orofino song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 04:04:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9582860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KilltheRhythm/pseuds/KilltheRhythm
Summary: Christian gets sent out to live with his grandparents by the beach in the middle of nowhere for the summer.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea for a sort of coming of age summer story that incorporated some mythology because I'm a huge nerd and I was like "yeah man I can totally write this in like a day or two" and then the word count kept going up and up and now I have the plot to this summer's new hit indie bestseller movie.

  
June 1st, 2000

Christian pulls one of his earbuds out, eyes still focused on the landscape blurring past the car window. Not too long ago it'd turned into lush tropical grass and palm trees, an appreciated change from the hours of woodlands they'd been driving through. He can hear his mother tell him they'd be at the beach house in only fifteen minutes. She said it with such excitement; only fifteen minutes!

He put his earbuds back in but lowers the volume by a click or two. A seagull swoops next to the car, chasing a dragonfly that very well may be the size of Christian's palm. Not too long after, only a song or three, he can see rows of beach houses rising in the distance.

His father rolls down the windows, allowing for the sea breeze to pass through the car. It smells like salt and something else that is unidentifiably ocean-y. The wind is strong and ruffles his hair. His mother beams, sunhat slipping off of the back of her head in a particularly strong gust.

They go through at least twenty houses until they find his grandparents' one, still baby blue and up on those high stilts. His grandparents look the same too, cheery and old in sun bleached clothing with shining smiles. They tell him how much he's grown, even though Christian is pretty sure he's still the same height.

Christian's cousins are already there, enveloping him in hugs and asking him how his junior year was. They'll only be here for a week, unlike Christian, who is stuck here for the entire summer.

Within hours he's out on the beach with them, embarrassingly pale compared to his cousins, who seemed to be gifted with the ability to not instantly sunburn. Still, under his layers of sunscreen, Christian smiles. He helps his youngest cousin build a sand castle, and waits for a boogie board to be freed up for him.

He hasn't really ridden waves before, which wasn't as surprising considering that he lived up in the northern states. Will guides him, showing him what to do as Christian stands knee deep in the water.

The waves aren't huge here in the gulf, but they're big enough for him to catch on his small board, and soon enough he's riding them too. It only takes him a few tries to get it right, and within a handful of minutes he's riding with his cousins Will and Mandy further out.

"Bet I can catch that one," Christian points towards the very beginnings of a wave forming in the near distance. Will whistles low, like he's saying Christian can't, which of course he takes as a challenge.

He starts paddling out, toes now unable to touch the bottom of the ocean, and then he feels it. It's the riptide, pulling him further out far faster than he can fight. In a panic, he tries to swim away from it as fast as possible, but it only pulls him underwater. Christian can feel his heartbeat in his ears as he thrashes. Adrenaline runs through his veins, but it's useless, he can't outswim the ocean.

In some desperate attempt to get help he opens his eyes underwater and screams. The salt water burns his eyes and the water enters his mouth, gets in his throat. Suddenly, he feels a hand catch his arm, and start pulling. He opens his eyes again for a snippet of a second to see a flash of blond hair and an arm pulling his along.

He resurfaces shortly, trying to gasp for air with water still in his throat and halfway to his lungs. The stranger continues to pull him as he paddles to shore, and eventually Christian can feel sand under his chest, and then leaving the water, which now only laps at his feet.

He tries to thank the stranger, but ends up coughing out water instead. It takes him a minute to regain full control of his breathing, and sees his board wash up on shore at that time. With a finally healthy amount of oxygen, he looks up at this mysterious savior, only to see someone about his age. This teenager has floppy blond hair that is shaggy on top and near buzzed on the sides, but he looks impossibly friendly.

Mysterious Stranger smiles at him, squatting down to get closer. Christian's still lying down, but has at least the energy to say something. "Hey," he croaks, now startled by the sound of his own voice. He clears his throat. "Thanks for saving my life."

Blond guy is still smiling, patting Christian on his shoulders. "Nah, no problem dude. Riptide gets pretty bad out here. You alright?"

"Yeah." Christian gets up to a sitting position. "Again, thanks. Thought I was gonna die."

Blond guy nods and goes back to standing, pacing over to where the board was now lying on the sand, and then hands it over to Christian. "Stay safe dude, yeah?"

He's already walking back into the water when Christian responds with a quiet "yeah". His cousins bound up to him, Mandy sliding into him to wrap her arms around his shoulders.

"Christian! Oh my god, are you okay?" Will yells. Christian nods.

"Oh thank heavens, we thought you were gonna die!" Mandy says, still hugging him. "You got swept so far out so fast, we tried to get you."

Christian nods again, finally getting up. He looks back out to the sea and gulps. That was more than enough ocean for him for a long time.

\----

He skittishly tries to avoid getting into the water for almost all of the next week. Instead he builds sand castles, finds shells and kicks his soccer ball around. His family rolls their eyes at his wariness, but don't force him into the water. He watches as they all go out into the ocean, from his littlest cousins to his grandparents.

The closest he does get to getting back into the water is the last day his cousins are there. He stands with the ocean up to the lower parts of his shins, watching as his family enjoys themselves splashing around further ahead. The sun is setting behind him, warming his back in the early summer evening. The wind whipped through his hair as he thought about going out to go be with them, but he knew that he was a little too wary to actually go do it.

His uncle comments on it as they leave the next morning. Will nods, hugging Christian and telling him "You better go out there more with us next summer! It was a shame that you wouldn't go with us as much this time."

Christian's youngest cousin hugs his waist. "It's okay! You built the best sandcastle ever, Christian!"

He beams at her, but Will's words stay in his mind for the rest of the day. He feels bad about not going into the water with his cousins, for being so scared of going out. When his grandpa offers to take him out on his boat, Christian sighs, contemplates it, and agrees.

It takes muscle from both of them, but they push the boat out and get it going. As they jet away from the beach, he swears he can see a familiar person on the rocks far, far away.

It's nice to be on a boat, Christian thinks, as they jet through the sea. His grandfather looks a lot like Santa Claus on vacation, beard wiggling in the wind. The ocean is as blue as it gets and the sky is bright, the breeze strong.

When the boat goes slower fish swim around it occasionally. They're iridescent, their scales sparkling in the water and moving in their own patterns. Christian leans over the side warily, but content to see ocean life. As he moves away from the side of the boat, he swears he can see a leg kick.

"Stop the boat!" he yells to his grandfather, who cuts the engine. They peer off of the sides of the boat, looking for any signs of a human body, but find none.

His grandfather furrows his brows, looking at Christian with a concerned expression on his face. "Well we didn't hear anything or feel it... I don't think we hit anyone."

"I hope not."

He pats Christian's shoulder, looking out to sea. "You probably just thought you saw something."

\----

Christian spends the next morning walking along the beach with his grandmother. She is a good bit slower than him, and he ends up leading by more than a few paces, and suddenly he can't see her at all. He looks around frantically, now worried that his poor grandma had been swept out to sea. He sees something tumble through the waves, and instinctively he runs towards it.

As he gets closer he realizes it is a body, and closer still he realizes that it is not his grandma. The person flops with another wave, rolling up the beach and posing in some twisted version of baywatch (if you asked Christian's mom about it, Christian had watched it for Pamela Anderson's acting, not all because of the bikini scenes).

"'Sup?" The person says, and just about then does Christian realize that it's Mysterious Stranger from last week. "It's Christian, right?"

The brunet takes a step back. "Why the hell do you know my name?"

Mysterious Stranger hops up to his feet. He's slightly shorter than Christian, which is a surprising feat considering Christian's height, but he's pretty much built. Christian feels a little envious, but then thinks that maybe the guy is just compensating for being only a few inches above five and a half feet.

"Your family was screaming it when I was saving you. I'm not trying to be creepy, okay?"

Christian nods. "Okay. You just kinda freaked me out there."

The blonde nods, golden hair flopping on his head. "You're still here? People usually leave after a week."

"Nah, here for the summer. You?"

The shorter teen's smile is bright and infectious. "Bro, I live here. You wouldn't believe how lonely it gets out here."

Well yeah, people only stay for a week or two out here, Christian thinks. "Where do you live?"

The blond flicks his wrist further down the beach as if to say "yeah, somewhere over there". "I'm Felix, by the way. Nice to meet you."

Christian shakes his hand. "Yeah, nice to meet you too." He pauses, and looks around. "Shit dude, I gotta go, I need to find my grandma."

Felix nods understandingly. "I can help you find her if you want."

Christian nods, says something along the lines of yeah sure man, and Felix is off. He doesn't really notice in what direction he goes, but the sound of splashing gives him an idea. He continues along in the sand, squinting over the horizon.

Christian jolts when he hears his grandmother's voice. She smiles and waves at him, standing on top of a particularly large sand dune. A massive conch shell is in her hand, and she beams, walking towards him.

"Found her!" Felix yells from where he stands in the water, pointing towards Christian's grandmother.

"Oh Christian, you found a friend!" She cheers, now close to him. "And look at what I found."

Christian looks over to Felix, who's now a lot closer to him. "That's a pretty big shell man." Felix drawls.

When Christian ends up in the car a few hours later with his grandma, she asks him about Felix. "Oh, he's adorable," she says, smiling at Christian.

"Yeah, I guess."

Apparently she's determined to talk to everyone that appears to be around Christian's age in the grocery store, not limited to and including store employees. She tries to engage one when they're buying vegetables, to a fantastic lack of success. He's got a puff of dark brown hair on his head and baby blue eyes, but looks at her cagily when she asks him if he's in high school "just like my grandson!"

Luckily for Christian, their checker is nowhere near his age. Instead he's a tan, scruffy man in his early thirties who's name on his name tag is quite possibly the most Greek thing Christian has ever seen. Also, according to his name tag, Sokratis Papastathopoulos is the head manager of the grocery store. To add to this, his grandmother of course knows Mr Papastathopoulos and then proceeds to have a conversation with him.

"I'm so sorry." Christian says to the bagger, a black teenager about his age. His name tag says "Hi I'm Ousmane"

"My mom is just like her." Ousmane says, putting the lettuce in a bag. Christian hands him the spinach.

"She's decided that she has to find every teenager out here for me to befriend." Christian says, putting milk into his own bag.

Ousmane's eyes are full of sympathy. "Dude, there's like only twenty of us at best, good luck with that." He extends his hand out to Christian's. "You new in town?"

Christian shakes his head. "Nah, I'm only here for the summer. Nice to meet you though, I'm Christian."

Ousmane slips the fajita meat into the bag with the milk. "You meet anyone out here yet?"

"One guy around our age, his name's Felix." Ousmane looks confused. "Blonde, short, pretty buff, hangs around the beach all the time."

Ousmane nods, and looks over to the manager. "Papa, you ever gonna actually finish checking her?"

"Ah yes, thank you." He rings up Christian's grandmother's order.

Later, in the staff room Ousmane asks the others if they knows Felix. Emre shrugs like he usually does, too stoned to really have any input. Ramos and Bartra shake their heads, tell him to ask Papa.

It's hard to get the boss to stop talking to people or moving around the store, and Ousmane finds himself stalking the Greek man through the store in hopes of getting an answer. It'd be great if there were another person his age here, preferably not a coworker that spent all of their money on pot.

"Wait! Boss!" Ousmane finally exclaims when Papa is about to go. The older man turns on his heel and looks at him expectantly. Ousmane knows that Sokratis knows everyone in the entire county, so he figure this is the guy to go to. "Do you know a Felix?"

The boss looks thoughtful for a long while, hand on his chin. "Hmm, I don't think I do. What does this Felix look like?"

Ousmane tries hard to remember what Christian had described him as. "Short, athletic, blonde? He's at the beach a lot?"

Sokratis, for the first time in all of Ousmane's knowing him, seems to not know the identity of someone living in the county. "I do not. Whenever Marco or Auba come by I will ask, okay?"

\----

When Christian isn't at the beach, he spends time with his grandparents, which mostly includes playing board games or talking to the neighbors. Christian quickly discovers that this is pretty boring, so he goes to the beach more often.

Felix is almost always there, somewhere in the ocean. Christian can't imagine him any other way, in board shorts with floppy blonde hair in various states of soaked with sea water. He's fun to talk to, more exciting than his grandparents and interesting enough to keep Christian going out to the ocean day after day.

After a week of this they get into a groove, Christian goes down to the beach at about 10 or so, meets up with Felix and leaves at noon for lunch. By two or three he's back out there, and is home for dinner.

This day is like any other. Christian eats oatmeal on the deck with his grandparents, watching seagulls lazily glide through the air, and listens to the radio with them. It's turned to some old person music station that plays frank Sinatra and the like, and his grandmother taps her foot to the beat.

She asks him what he's going to do today, and he answers like he always does; he's going down to the beach. They can see the ocean from where they sit; dark blue and green waves crashing further out and their remnants hitting the shore, balmy winds that carry salt and tall white sand dunes closer to their house.

He grabs the board that his cousins left behind and starts his trek out to the water, feeling the sun on his face. He can see the hired lawnmower far down in the south, slowly making his way to Christian. The grass in his grandparents' yard is lush and dark green, now overgrown. He can feel it brush against his feet in his flip flops. It slowly switches to sand as he makes his way in the trail, with tall grasses and cactus on either side. As he reaches the top of the hill that the trail is on, now completely sand, he squints and scans the coastline for a familiar figure. Only sometimes he can spot Felix, and today is not one of those days.

He jogs down the hill as quickly as one can in flipflops through sand, the long pale yellow grass hitting him occasionally. Dragonflies buzz around his head pleasantly, and when he turns to look back at the row of houses, he can see his grandfather wave. He waves back and then makes his way to the shore.

As he puts his things down under a massive piece of driftwood, he can hear quiet footsteps under the heavy sounds of wind. He turns around to see Felix, beaming from ear to ear as always.

"Bro!" He says, all smiles. "You're here!"

Christian smiles back, keeping a hand on his baseball cap to keep the wind from taking it. He'll have to tighten it soon. "When are you not here, Felix?"

Felix is still smiling, now walking back towards the waves. His hair drips with water, and Christian wonders if he's actually ever seen it dry. "Never, bro. I'm always here. The ocean is pretty much my home."

They wade out into the water, Christian with his board and Felix with empty hands. The waves are choppy but plentiful, like how they can be in the mornings when you can still see the moon in the sky. Christian shuffles his feet, like how his parents had taught him, to keep stingrays and crabs away. Felix walks freely, like how he does most things.

They don't start off too well, or Christian doesn't really. Felix is a natural at this, doesn't even need a board to catch waves. He tries to help Christian, but the brunet has a feeling that even if he were to try his hardest, he couldn't be anywhere near Felix's level.

"Hey, Chris." Felix taps a hand on Christian's shoulder as a swell forms in the distance. "Catch that one."

Christian frowns skeptically. "That's way too far out!" Felix, however, has already started to paddle out towards it as it grows taller. He swims impressively fast, diving into the wave as it begins to crest.

For a second he can't see Felix, but then the blonde emerges on top of the wave, riding with it. Christian gets himself ready to hop on too, and makes it. For a few moments they're together, jetting atop the sea, a rush of wind on their backs and a rush of water on their stomachs.

The wave takes them all the way to shore, where they wash up on the firmer sand, smaller waves breaking on their legs. The sun hits their chests, their eyes still closed. There's a sense of zen peace to this, the harmony between the sun and the wind and the sea.

They don't talk much, both happily resting where the surf met sand, but neither seem to mind. Felix seems to sense Christian's slow breathing and matches his accordingly. Occasionally tiny crabs scuttle over their feet, but the two stay still so they don't pinch.

"Hey," Christian says, starting to feel hunger in the pit of his stomach. "Wanna go to my place for lunch?"

Felix pops up into a sitting position. He stares out into the ocean for a bit, quietly observing it endlessly tumble over itself and foam. Felix closes his eyes briefly, then looks back to Christian. "Yeah," he says softly. "Sure."

Christian starts to walk back to the driftwood where he'd placed his things, unlooping the cord from the board around his wrist and relooping it around the driftwood. Felix dashes off somewhere, presumably to collect his things, and sighing a few minutes they're walking up the path to Christian's grandparents' beach house.

Luckily his grandparents take kindly to Felix, charmed by his friendliness and energy. They didn't seem to notice that he still kinda smelled like the ocean and brine, were more impressed that his knowledge of all things aquatic rivaled even Christian's granddad.

His grandmother brings them food, which they end up eating in the shade of the deck, with the wind in their hair and shadows on their frames. It's almost weird to see Felix in a T shirt, even though he's still wearing those familiar board shorts. His hair is the driest Christian has ever seen, but still a little damp.

"Your house is really nice," Felix gushes between bites of his sandwich. "Like really really nice. The view is so good!"

Christian can feel a small amount of heat rise to his face. "Oh, it's not really that great."

Felix clamps a warm hand on his arm. "Trust me, it is."

"We should go to yours then, to compare."

Felix's face loses all traces of color. He shakes his head frantically. "No no no no. Yours has a way better view. Way way better."

Christian senses a chance to get at his friend. "Nah mate, we should see yours!"

More rapid head shakes. Felix was actually genuinely nervous about this. "No. Trust me, you wouldn't want to go to mine."

Christian raises an eyebrow. Strange wasn't it that he knew a good bit about Felix, but hadn't s clue on where he'd come from. He decides that it's better to drop the subject, and they sit on the deck, waiting for noon to pass.

Christian ends up falling asleep on the wood of the deck, lulled by the warm air and the slight ocean breeze. When he wakes up, Felix is nowhere to be found.

\----

Ousmane sighed for what seemed to be the thousandth time. This shift always seemed to be the slowest, especially when his lunch break was only ten minutes away.

Papa eyed him, then looked at the clock, then looked back at him. Next he stared at the tiny elderly woman checking out an obscene amount of eggs at Marc's line. Marc flashes a worried smile at him. The lady is on her thirteenth box of a dozen eggs.

He mouths to Ousmane. The eggs. Ousmane nods. I'm scared, Marc mouths. Ousmane shrugs.

"You can start your lunch break now." Sokratis tells him. Meanwhile, Marc is still checking eggs.

Ousmane walks to the back room, nabbing a loaf of the warm French bread they had on a shelf. The back room wasn't much of a room, more of a glorified storage closet, but it was where all of the younger employees at the grocery store hung.

Emre was (unsurprisingly) already in the room, with his lunch, also stolen from the store. "'Sup?" he drawls.

Ousmane hops onto a pile of storage crates, the closest things they had to seats. "Hey Emre."

Emre nods at him. "You seem unhappy." He pauses, slowly bobbing his head in approval of this assessment. "I know what'd make you feel better, bro."

Ousmane's eyebrows are nearing his hairline. "If it is what I think it is--"

Emre is indignant. "All you do is judge me!"

"I don't even know how you get away with it, man. Mama Mor must be so oblivious."

Emre looks slightly offended at the mention of his mother, but his range of emotion is pretty low. "Hey! It's not that hard though. You just gotta be stoned so often that people just think it's your personality."

Ousmane shakes his head disdainfully. "Whatever dude. Anyways, what would you think about going to the beach with me after work tomorrow?"

"Woah there, Mr Changing the Subject. Since when did you want to go to the beach?"

Ousmane shakes his head. He knows Emre knows that he gets lonely. Their town is tiny, and their school even smaller. It doesn't help that Ousmane likes company, and preferably that of people who are not stoned every waking minute of every day.

He also knows that Emre's dealer lives in a beach house, and that if nothing else would get him to go, that would.

Meanwhile, back by the beach, a tall man with skin the color of chestnuts and spiky hair stood facing the ocean. The wind whipped past his ears and through his hair, and the water clung to his ankles. If he looked at the ocean just right, he could see a man's face made out of the sea foam.

"Anyanwu," the voice said, gruff and low. He smiled. It's been a long time since anyone'd called him that name, even those he'd held dearly. "How is my son doing?"

The god standing with his feet in the water laughed. "How should I know? I barely talk to him!"

The ocean's voice does not sound amused. "He left today. Not for a long while, but for a bit."

Anyanwu chuckled. "I wouldn't worry. He's a teenager after all, he's going to explore. He won't stray too far though, you know that." He paused. "I'll keep an eye on him though."

The voice sighed low. He thanked him for the information, even though the standing man knew little on the subject. He claimed that it was amazing how much Anyanwu knew despite not having any children of his own. Again, he agreed to watch out for the god of the ocean's son. There was a reward promised.

The man began to trek back to the beach houses on the coastline. He could see his own home, a tall, spindly thing on stilts, a red pink on its walls. If he were to focus closely on the top deck, he could see a blonde, slightly scruffy man waving, a sleeve of tattoos on his left arm.

He bounds up the steps to his house, still in a bright mood. Then again, he was generally cheery. It felt good to be needed, when so long ago his people had stopped praying to him.

Even his own partner notices this change in mood. "You seem happy," he says, enveloping the sun god in a hug.

"Moccus," Anyanwu says in a hushed, low voice. The jolt in his partner's movements puts a grin on his face. "We're needed."

The blond looks excited, mouth curving into a smile. "What is it?"

They're both in the house now, still in close proximity with each other. Eventually the blonde pulled him onto the couch with him, asking again what was going on.

"He," the African man breaths, looking down at the shorter man underneath him. "Poseidon, whatever you want to call him, he wants us to keep an eye on his kid."

The blonde giggles up at him, entire body shaking with laughter. Both of them can feel it. "You're excited over a babysitting gig?"

The taller man pouts, legs still on either side of the blonde man. "We're rubbing elbows with the big guys. Moving up in the world."

"Talking business, are we now?" The blonde smirks, pulling the darker skinned man down. "When do we start?"

\----

Christian can feel the sun beating down on his back as he walks up the hill. He may be slathered from head to toe in sunscreen, but he knows he'll have to reapply in an hour to keep from looking like a freshly boiled lobster.

He had barely made it down to the water when Felix runs up to him, excitement painted on his features. If there had been a thought on Christian's mind earlier about talking to Felix about abandoning him earlier, it left as soon as the blonde entered his line of sight.

"Christian," Felix grins, a hand on Christian's shoulder. His voice is the perfect volume to be heard over the sound of the ocean, not too loud or too quiet. "I saw the coolest thing."

Christian raises an eyebrow. "And that would be?"

Felix shakes his head, a smile still on his face. "I'm not just spoiling the surprise like that. You'll just have to see."

Christian watches as Felix turns and starts to walk along the surf, leaving footprints in the wet sand that only last for a few seconds. He finds himself rooted in place, unable to move for reasons that he can't think of. Felix turns around to stare at him expectantly and give him a huffy "c'mon!", and only then does Christian start to move.

They walk along on the beach together at a steady pace. Felix alternates between whistling and humming a tune, which seems to align with their footsteps. The wind blows into their ears and their hair, the sun sharp on their features.

In the distance, something huge juts out of the sand. As they grow closer, it reveals itself to be a tree, one that had long ago been uprooted and had floated all the way from the ocean to where it was now, planted firmly in the sand. Felix makes a mad run towards it, Christian following. They scrabble across the sand, Felix only a yard ahead of Christian, leaping over a pit where the grains had divotted, and onto the trunk of the tree.

Christian follows suit, landing on the warm wooden thing. The tree was positively massive, still wet with the briny water of the ocean and they could feel the grains of sand underneath their feet. Christian follows Felix up the branches that lie parallel to the ground, a darkened black with sea plants growing on them.

Felix opens his mouth to speak, but Christian steals the words from his mouth: isn't this great? And honestly, Christian would have never imagined himself to be so happy to spend a summer with his grandparents in the middle of nowhere. Even though the wifi was dodgy, he had a friend and world to explore, and suddenly that was enough to satisfy him.

The sun seems to shine down even more brightly than before, blanketing everything in a bright warm light. Christian has to squint his eyes tightly to see, and Felix has given up, pretty much having completely closed his. He thinks he might hear footsteps, but the wind is strong and he's still so focused on the light, how strong and heavy it is. He opens his eyes for a millisecond to confirm, yes, there is someone coming, or to be more specific: two somebodies coming.

Felix seems frozen in place, looking down at the two men approaching them. It's not out of fear, but he certainly doesn't look pleased either. The sun still shines down brightly, threatening to turn everyone into silhouettes. Christian wishes he brought his sunglasses.

"Hello," one of the men says, and either the light gets dimmer or Christian's eyes have adjusted because he can now clearly see the two men that stand before them. One is blonde, with stubble and a sleeve of tattoos poking out from underneath his light weight button up. It's in a whiteish tone, one that he can't tell if it has blue or purple tones in it, while his partner's shirt is in a pastel hue. The other man was black, with a spiky mohawk of sorts and the brightest teeth Christian had ever seen.

"Hello," Felix mirrors, still remaining unmoved from his seat in the tree's branches. Wasn't it strange to see someone so alive in something so dead? The thought fleets through Christian's mind.

"You're the neighbors' grandkid, huh?" says the blonde one. Christian nods. "Nice to meet you. I'm Marco."

He extends a hand up and out towards Christian. His partner shakes Christian's hand next, then introduces himself. "Auba. Pleasure to meet you." The man turns his attention towards Felix now, still with the perfect smile on his face. "And I believe we've met before, maybe?"

"Yeah, I think I might've seen you around a few times." Felix smiles at them, hops down to a lower part of the tree to shake their hands. "I'm Felix."

They converse for a while, mostly asking Felix questions, but occasionally directing one towards Christian. Only during this conversation does Christian realize how little he knew about his friend, and how little information Felix gave to these two neighbors as well.

"Oh yeah, Christian," Marco says, looking at the teenager with a knowing expression on his face. He and his partner looked perfect, their hair styled just so and their clothes remaining unwrinkled and clean. "Give this to your grandparents. They've been asking me for some information for a while now."

The card he hands Christian is small and unassuming. It's clearly for business, but he hands one to Felix too, who swiftly pockets it. The cards are golden yellow with a small black sun on the top. Beneath the sun is an even tinier eye, in the same charcoal shades. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Marco Reus: Costal King Realtors is emblazoned on the front.

"So you know them?" Christian asks as they walk back along the surf. The water splashes along their ankles and occasionally calves, but Felix's hair is dry for once. It's the color of the sand when the sun hits it, brassy and blonde gold.

The shorter boy scratches the back of his head in thought, blue eyes squinting. "Yeah. They've been here forever," he pauses to chuckle. "but so have I."

"They seem alright."

Felix shakes his head from side to side, in the so so motion. "I guess, upper class couple 'n all. Prefer you though."

Christian's smile grows. "Thanks. I like hanging with you too."

\-----

Christian kept a hand on top of his hat to prevent the strong wind from snatching it. The boat rocked a little, waves swaying it side to side. It sat a little lower in the water this time, with the added weight of Felix in it.

His grandfather gave them instructions and information on the boat that were almost instantly rendered obsolete by the blonde, who seemed to know everything related to the ocean and more. Aboriginal sea god? He knew it. When low tide was coming? Knew that too. What type of fish were common around this part of the ocean? Felix could tell you what type and approximately how many you could find at the moment.

"Damn," the elderly man whistled low, impressed. "How do you know all of that?"

Felix shrugs nonchalantly, like he doesn't have some sixth, ocean related sense. The water was much stiller today than any other, waves only barely bumping the vessel. The only sounds were the gusts of wind that were land bound and the quiet hum of the boat's motor. It was never like this, calm and slow. Especially these past few weeks, where the ocean had been more violent, with hard and fast choppy waves.

It happens quickly, so quickly that no one has much time to react. Christian's grandfather motions towards the shore with his hand, and somehow his wristwatch is falling, entering the water. The expensive piece makes a plop sound as it goes down.

Then Felix has hopped out of the boat after it, crashing into the sea as well. For a few moments he is out of sight, beneath the surface and at unknown depths, but then he bobs back up, chest not even heaving.

"Here." he hands the watch back, smile on his face as he throws himself over the side to get back into the boat. He's barely even wet, like he went too fast for the water really touch him. He beams, seemingly especially proud of himself.

"How the hell..." Christian's grandfather trails off, seemingly amazed by the teenager.

Felix doesn't brag much, but the little look he gives Christian speaks volumes. The next time he has the same expression on his face is when he tries to teach Christian how to bodysurf, catch waves without a board. Christian is undeniably horrible at it, timing off and positioning even worse, while his friend glides through the ocean like a motherfucking dolphin.

Felix tries his best to teach him, pointing and making hand motions that are supposed to direct Christian but only make the teenager more confused. It's like the sea loves Felix, is willing to do whatever he says, and has no such affection for Christian. He's sure there's some rhythm to it that Felix naturally already has, that he will most likely never obtain, the easy confidence his friend has when he surfs.

"It's okay, you did fine," Felix consoles him at the end of the day. The sun is close to setting, shadows becoming fantastically long and forms more dim. They're both almost silhouettes or shadows, save for Felix's eyes, the shade of blue where the sea meets the sky.

"Yeah," Christian says, leaning in for a hug, even though he wasn't that disappointed in himself. The proximity was just nice, he says to himself, leaning into the other teen's chest. You got lonely out here.

He feels his heart beat a little faster as Felix's forehead knocks into his, arms still tight on the small of Christian's back. Yeah, you got lonely out here.

He keeps telling himself that in his downtime, which admittedly isn't a lot. Between spending all of his time at the beach with Felix or with his grandparents, he (joyfully) doesn't get many moments to himself to contemplate things. If he does he tries to sleep them away.

It's better, he decides, that way. Thinking things over would only complicate his friendship and jeopardize the little paradise he has going on. He could live like this, spending his time in the ocean with someone he refused to actually contemplate his relationship with.

He still goes to the grocery store with his grandmother, partially because it was a change of scenery and partially because it was his only other chance to see other teenagers. Ousmane and Emre work at the store most of the time, or at least the times that Christian went there.

Ousmane is more than a little intrigued by his descriptions of Felix. Christian feels the need to be a little possessive, because it was he who found Felix first. Upon second thought, he realizes that it's ridiculous to be like that, and that his friend is a person and not an item to be kept. It isn't that that cools him down more though, it's that he remembers that Felix doesn't even know who Ousmane is.

"How the hell haven't I met this Felix dude?" Ousmane complains as he runs yet another box of cereal through the checker. Christian shrugs. Apparently, Ousmane had gone down to the beach two separate times without any luck.

The first time he'd hitched a ride with his boss, a man so Greek that neither Christian nor any employee at the store could correctly pronounce his name. There wasn't a chance in hell that they could get Sokratis Papastathopoulos right, so he only referred to him as "papa". Papa'd offered to drive him over to the beach, and Ousmane, without his usual bike as an option, decided to take it.

The ride may have been a mistake, with Papa blasting Greek folk music, windows rolled all the way down. Ousmane sat in the shotgun seat, watching someone who could have easily been an extra from My Big Fat Greek Wedding sing-shout along in his native language.

Ousmane had hopped out of the car as quickly as possible, shouting a thanks over the loud noise blaring out of his boss's car radio. Sokratis yells something back that could have just as easily been a "you're welcome" as the next words to the song.

Ousmane wandered around the beach, sand slowly filling his converse shoes. Eventually, now much closer to the more hard packed, wet sand, he popped them off, shaking out what seemed to be at least a half pound of sand per shoe. The ocean was nice, far better than he remembered, with a hefty breeze and a comforting air to it, something almost dreamlike.

He continued to trek along the land where the sea met the ground, soft waves occasionally running over his ankles. There was some sort of slow, lazy rhythm to it all, the drone of the ocean and the steady whip of the wind. Still, he spotted no one. Six thirty PM on a Monday seemed to not be the time to find anyone at the beach.

He checked his watch: he'd spent about thirty five minutes just walking along the beach. No one. He'd spotted no one. Not a single person. Sighing, he gave up. Today was not the day where he'd get to meet this new and mysterious potential friend. Felix was probably at home eating dinner like everyone else was, while he walked along the surf at dusk like a madman.

Ousmane takes one last long look at the ocean before he goes to catch his bus. No one was visible along the beach or even in the water. Not a soul to be found. As he turns his head back, feet already in the motion to put himself forward, he sees in the corner of his eyes what seems to be a pair of legs kicking out of the water. He almost jolts around, runs back to the beach to see who it is, but that'd set him far back, make him late, and daylight was already running short.

He spends the bus ride tapping his feet and staring out the window. In the back of his mind, he can still see the kick of someone far out in the ocean, legs flying against the purple sky filled with hazy clouds.

The second time he goes is only a few days after the first. Finally, he's convinced Emre to make the trip down to the bay with him. Of course, Emre's set special conditions, he always does. They'd bike to work from their homes in the suburbs like usual, then after work bike to the bus stop, take the bus that'd get the closest to the rows of beach houses (living out in the near rural areas it wasn't that close, but it saved them time and energy, and in Emre's case, a sunburn), bike to Emre's dealer's beach house, and then walk to the beach.

It was a rather long winded plan, one that Emre lazily drawled, trying to explain to Marc during their break. He was high (like usual), with a Twinkie in his left hand and slowly gesticulating with the right. Ousmane watched it all, and was starting to think about his life choices that lead to the blue eyed teenager to being his best friend. It wasn't like there were many other options though, so he sighed and shook his head, erasing the thoughts.

In the last ten minutes of his shift, Emre walks up to him, patting Ousmane on the shoulder softly. Ousmane turns around, already knowing that he'll see blue eyes and puffy hair.

"'Sup?" Emre says with a flash of pearly teeth. "Ready to go?"

Ousmane checks his watch, then looks back at Emre with a look that says more than a thousand words. "Ten minutes left in the shift, man. Don't wanna clock out early."

Emre sighs, shaking his head. "Bro, you're only missing out on a dollar twenty five," he pauses, mouth breaking into a smirk. "that and I already clocked you out. Let's go."

As they bike to the bus stop that'll take them closest to the ocean, Ousmane angles his head so he can look at both the road ahead and Emre. "How the hell did you do that math so quick?"

Emre, now coasting down the hill with arms crossed behind his head, shrugs. "Dunno. Just can. Math's my thing, y'know? That's why I clocked you out early-- timed it with the bus schedule." He taps his head thoughtfully, still without a hand on the handlebars.

Ousmane shakes his head and calls it all bullshit. But sure enough, they arrive at the bus stop only a minute before the city bus does. They both flash the driver their high school IDs so they can pay reduced price and sit closest to the AC vent. It's late June and the summer heat is absolutely insufferable, especially with the humidity. Only then does Ousmane turn to Emre again with a surprised look on his face.

"Told you. Math's my thing. That, and the busses here are scary consistent." Emre's smile is lazy and confident, like it's obvious that he's a genius at mathematics.

Ousmane rolls his eyes and wonders how the goddamned county bus system became the focal point of their conversations. His thoughts drift out to how tiny of a town they lived in, and how boring things got. Lord, he craved some variety, something new and interesting, even though Emre wasn't even talking about the bus system now, instead going on about this new strain of kush he was going to buy.

He's still talking about weed when they unload their bikes from the bus. Emre's dealer scribbled out an address for where they should meet-- luckily only at the start of the beach houses. The bike ride there is long and disgustingly sticky and humid. Within a minute their shirts are sticking to their backs, and the air is so thick that it feel like they're peddling through soup.

Emre doesn't talk about weed anymore now. He's actually not talking at all, and neither is Ousmane. It only seems to get hotter as they bike, the address of where they were supposed to go glimmering in their minds like some beacon of hope. There would be air conditioning and a break from the sun beating down on their backs, and water. Water. The sound of rushing water has slowly become audible, getting louder at such a pace that now it seems like it's creeped up and surprised them.

A wind has picked up now, salty and full of brine and other words that they'd learned to associate with the ocean. It smells like how the sea does, and it's a thankful change from the still, muggy air. Emre raises his arms up away from the handles of the bike to allow the wind to hit even more surface area, cooling him off as much as the wind could in the thick humidity.

It takes them what seems like a lifetime to get to Emre's dealer's beach house, and at this point Ousmane thinks that it is quite possible that he's sweated out a pound or more of water. They lock their bikes under the overhang, between the dealer's scuffed up minicooper and canoe. The boat was sun bleached and faded, but the paddles were well worn.

Slowly they make their way up the creaking wooden steps, watching the air conditioning unit slowly drip water from the window, falling softly on grass and concrete below. Emre is the one to knock on the door, rapping his knuckles on it with minimal levels of attention.

They wait for a few beats, hear footsteps slowly become louder. The door unlocks, swings open, and it's a bit of a surprise who they see. A chubby blonde smiles at them, in basketball shorts and a tank top that was probably a little too tight fitting for his physique. He beckons them indoors, and happily they enter, air conditioning cool and refreshing on their backs.

"'Suh dude?" Emre says, fist bumping Mario. Mario wiggles his hands in a hang loose sign.

"Bro, you didn't tell me that Ousmane was coming with you!" Mario smiles. Ousmane is more than a little surprised that Mario remembers him, the blonde being two and a half years his senior and three grades ahead of him.

"Oh, yeah man. It's kind of a given. He's the bro," Emre drawls, patting the other teen on the back lazily.

Mario nods, turning away from them to go towards another room in his beach house. "Y'all sit down. I'm gonna go get the goods."

With those words the two teenagers plopped down onto the kitchen chairs nearest to the air conditioning unit. They basked in the cool air, quiet. Ousmane was surprised that Mario still lived out here in the boonies, but then remembered exactly why he did. The blonde's parents owned the beach house, he was studying marine biology at the nearby university, and he was the town's local weed dealer. If Ousmane was just one of those things he'd stay here in the summer too.

"This place is pretty sick, right?" Emre says quietly. Mario's (loud) footsteps were now upstairs. "He's like the man," a pause "you remember him, right?"

Ousmane nods. "Of course I do. He's just..." He doesn't know how to phrase this without being rude, especially in the few years that he hasn't seen Mario. "He's like, heavier?"

"Freshman fifteen dude." Emre pauses, tilts his head side to side. "Or twenty, I guess." He chuckles at his own words.

Before Ousmane can even think of a response, Mario slides down the stairs of the house, with a small ziplock bag full of weed. "Aight, here's the stuff we agreed on." He smiles, then shows Emre and Ousmane what is in his other hand. "And this is for right now."

Ousmane has never smoked in his life before, and while he's pretty sure that both Emre and Mario know that, he doesn't plan on being obvious. Mario is low on rolling paper, and apparently does not trust Emre with his bong, so he rips a few pages from the bible and starts rolling joints. He can blow perfect smoke rings, and Emre's are more than good as well. Ousmane tries not choke when he inhales.

"This stuff is pretty good, yeah?" Mario says, smiling at the two teens sitting next to him on his couch. Emre nods languidly. Ousmane is still trying to fit in.

"I don't think I'm high." Ousmane says in a small voice. He doesn't feel any different, but he looks at the two beside him with a degree of worry.

"I didn't get high the first time, bro. You'll get there." Emre says, patting him on the shoulder. He pockets the weed that he'd bought, hands Mario the cash, and then stands up. "But I think we ought to be going."

They bid their adieus and hop down the steps of the beach house. The path leading from the thin stretch of grass ahead of the houses to the beach shines a sandy white with the sun beating down on it. Instantly it's hot again, but the winds are picking up, a little relief from the oppressively muggy weather. Pelicans fly in their set patterns above them, casting rows of linear shadows on the landscape below.

Emre and Ousmane kick off their shoes once they make it over the large dune that separates the grass from the beach. The sand is scorching hot, and they hop about frantically, trying not to burn the soles of their feet.

Emre is the one who makes a dash to the ocean first, throwing his converse on top of some driftwood and plunging his feet into the water. He sighs, wading out a little further. For a moment he stands with his back to Ousmane, wind slamming into his frame, making his hair wild and his shirt ripple like the waves crashing in the sea. He cranes his neck to face Ousmane, blue eyes glimmering. "Are you coming?"

Ousmane realizes that he's been standing still for a little too long, soles of his feet feeling like they're on fire. Instantly he rushes to the water, seeking relief. Once the burning sensation has faded he focuses on moving around in the water with Emre, who has now fully dunked himself.

Emre shakes the water out of his hair like a poodle would, brown curls flinging droplets in all directions. He stares at Ousmane like the other teen is the weirdo, and Ousmane sighs, submerging himself. The gulf water is cool but not freezing, and once he's out of it he doesn't seem too hot anymore. Now he can focus more on looking for this mystery blonde teenager.

They go up and down the surf for what seems like an actual eternity, looking for someone that isn't there. There's barely anyone even at the beach today, and all of their encounters consist of one elderly lady and her dog. Emre, still very high, asks her if she knows a Felix. She in return asks for a description but shakes her head, saying that she'd seen someone who looked like that a few times, but not today.

They've spent at least two hours looking, and at this point neither of them have the patience to continue. Emre plops down where the waves barely reach, and Ousmane squats next to him. The sun is brilliantly bright, beating down on their backs and already starting to dry their shirts.

"Hello?" A distinctly male voice said. The voice didn't sound like it was from this part of the United States, but neither adolescent could put a finger on where it came from.

Both of them turn around to see the familiar couple from the grocery store. The blonde one was the one to speak, his mouth parting in a toothy grin. His partner stood near him, the two wearing their usual pastel button downs. They'd seen the duo countless times, frequenters to their grocery store. Papa, who knew absolutely everyone, knew them well, called them by first names and nicknames ("Marco and Auba" Emre said when the couple finally left "that's what he calls them") that Ousmane was sure he was not familiar with enough to use.

"Hello." Ousmane says back with a certain degree of nervousness. It sounds a little bit more like a question than he'd like to admit, so he follows it up with an actual inquiry. "How are you?"

"Doing good. How about you two? Alright?" The African man says, flashing shining teeth. They're almost painfully white, and his entire face has this golden glow, like he's made out of rays of the actual sun.

"Yeah, we're alright. Lookin' for someone we can't find, that's all." Emre drawls in the same lazy time of voice that he usually has. Ousmane resists the urge to hit himself in the face because his best friend just can't help but tell everyone what they're doing. Emre'd always been an open book, and usually it was fine, because usually Ousmane didn't conspire with him, but apparently if he did of course Papa's gay best friends would know.

"Hmm," the blonde one of the couple said, scratching his chin "was he blonde, blue eyes, kinda buff and about this high?" He puts his arm up a little higher shoulder height.

Emre giggles, and only because Ousmane knows him well, is about to say: I'm that high right now. The darker teenager speaks before that can happen. "Yes, that's him. Do you know him?"

The couple nods, still smiling. They give off an aura of contentness. "We know his dad. I don't think he's here today. Funny really, he's here every day and the one that he's not is the one that you show up."

The two sitting teenagers nod, dejected, and make meager conversation with the couple. Eventually the adults leave, and Emre gets up with a sigh, walking out into the ocean. They'd make the best of visiting the sea.

They bike back to the bus stop together, Emre cheerfully whistling a White Stripes song and Ousmane grumbling. That was the last time he listened to mostly strangers at the grocery store.

Meanwhile, Felix and Christian were at the aforementioned HEB. Christian's grandmother was fantastically pleased that her grandson had found such a good friend, and Felix just seemed excited to be away from the beach. He'd bounced slightly in his seat of Christian's grandmother's Subaru, hummed along to the music she played.

Felix made the mundane seem fantastic, and grocery shopping was no different. He wandered through the store, gravitating towards anything that held any particular interest (the tropical fruit seemed to be a favorite) and smiled, listening whenever Christian or Christian's grandmother pointed out a weirdo to him.

"How often do you even go to grocery stores?" Christian asks when Felix oggles at the napoles.

"Not too often." Felix chuckles sheepishly. Christian smiles at him, feeling some warmth in his chest. He swings an arm over Felix's shoulders, walking with him, then thinks about the guys at his school who did that to their girlfriends and how dumb they looked, and ripped his arm away immediately. It gets him a look from his blonde friend, and he can feel heat rushing into his cheeks.

"You alright?" Felix asks, concern on his features. Christian looks back at him, and suddenly realizes how close they are. Were they always like that?

"Uh," Christian pauses for a beat "yeah, I think so."

His grandma arrives before Felix can say or do anything more, and Christian silently thanks the heavens. At noon in a semi rural grocery store is not the time or place to have an internal crisis. Still, he finds himself lost in his thoughts, from checking out with the incredibly Greek man to lunch with Felix and his grandma to going back to the beach with his friend.

"Are you okay?" Felix asks him sometime the next week. They're sitting on the surf together, letting the water slowly wash over their legs. A crab scuttles sideways not too far away.

Christian looks at Felix. He thinks for a second, thinks about how much he's been thinking, and then realizes he's probably overthought the whole thing. Of course Felix would be in his thoughts all the time, after all they were together every day. It was normal. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just kinda've been thinking 'bout something."

Felix pauses for a moment, looks out at the sea. The light hits his features nicely, all golden and bronze from his time in the sun. His hair is flaxen, a word Christian isn't completely sure he knows the definition of but seems to fit, and his eyes are sea blue. Christian starts to wonder if it's weird to think about your best friend like that, but Felix interrupts his internal monologue.

"So, what's been consuming your thoughts, Mr Pulisic?" He grins, now turned to face Christian with his back to the sea. Christian can feel the sun on his back and warmth in his face.

"Uhhhhhhh," Christian wishes entirely that he wasn't an awkward seventeen year old boy right now.

"Is it me?" Felix asks, and Christian knows he's teasing him, completely joking but he's too close to being right. He lets out another uh and Felix is only an inch or two away from his face. Unsure of his friend is joking, trying to psyche him out or lord knows what else, Christian stays stock still, face completely lobster red as Felix gets nearer and nearer, his eyes sliding shut and

A massive wave slams into Felix's back, shoved him into the surf and then pulls him out. Felix pushes himself back up to standing, saltwater dripping from his shorts. He laughs, wading over to Christian and pulling him into the next wave.

The sea stays choppy for the rest of the day, heavy waves creating and breaking erratically. They stay particularly close together when they surf, Christian still wary of the ocean. From afar, Auba and Marco watched the water.

"Is it just me, or did it just get a lot crazier out there?" Marco asks, ankles deep in water that still has a strong pull.

Auba hums low in thought. He can feel Marco's hand ghost next to his. "Yeah, something's up," he pauses, watch a wave too massive for the gulf to normally create crest far out. "definitely something."

Marco frowns, cranes his neck as he looks out to see if he can still see the two teens in the sea. The worry is heavy in his voice. "I wonder what happened," he frowns, grimaces almost because he can hear how his voice is near cracking "did we fuck up?"

Auba turns to Marco, grabs his hand so he can pull him closer, and carefully watches the other man's facial features. "It's not our fault, Marco. They're kids."

Marco looks down, frowning. "Just," he pauses, bites his lip "fuck," he breaths "Just, this was like our chance to get somewhere, and I know it's basically a babysitting job, I mean we're spying on teenagers but if we mess this up we could ruin everything an--"

Auba puts a hand on either side of Marco's face and shhs him quietly. "Marco. Marco, calm down. We're doing what we're supposed to. Keep an eye on them. We're not gonna go police on their asses, that'd be weird."

Marco breaths heavy, puts one hand on Auba's shoulder and another on his waist. Auba's hands are still on the sides of his face. He can feel the wind whipping around his ears and if he closes his eyes he can remember when they first met.

They were two strangers in a new land, in a time when everyone believed in the gods. Their accents were thicker, speaking more often than not in their own native languages, when now it was a rarity to think in them. If he tries a little bit harder he remembers when they were always called Anyanwu and Moccus, when people feared them. Now they had names that didn't conjure up images of gods, and now there was a new fear, one of just their own, of being forgotten.

He snaps out of his train of thought again, warm hands still on him and sighs. Auba frowns, sliding a thumb across his cheek. They kiss briefly, before the taller man pulls him into a hug.

Felix pops up from where he'd plunged further into the water. He treads calmly, while Christian flops closer to him. "Don't look now, but," he wolf whistles.

Christian turns to see the two adults further away in the surf, but a wave pushes him deep into the water. His feet can't touch the bottom and instantly familiar panic spreads through his limbs. He paddles upwards, sputtering after he bobs up.

Another massive wave pushes them over, and they end up staying on shore for a long time.

\----

The sea stays crazy and chaotic the rest of the week, and with the ocean's erratic behavior comes an additional sense of stress in Felix. He seems worried about something more often than not, and even though he tries to cover it up with smiles and extra conversation, he's a bad lier. It's obvious that he's nervous about something, though Christian was a little too absorbed in his own worries to really tell that Felix was too.

Even his grandparents seem to notice it though. Occasionally they join the two out on the beach, never going as far out as Christian, or Felix, who would paddle even further than Christian into the choppy waves. Sometimes Christian would ride into shore only to find that Felix was still far out into the water, or not even visible.

Felix stays out for an extended period of time one day, enough to worry both Christian's grandmother and Christian himself. Nervously he paces about the shore line for a few moments, trying to see if he can spot a familiar face, or anything that would lead him to know where Felix was. Fruitless and panicked, he and his grandmother eventually started wading out into the sea, yelling Felix's name every few minutes.

The ocean calms quickly and suddenly, when Christian and his grandmother are only about at knee level in the water. The rapid and powerful walls of water cede into soft, slow waves, but it doesn't do much to help Christian's worries, which had now turned from being about his feelings to Felix's safety.

He's made it to waist level when a mop of blonde hair suddenly pops up behind him. Felix is smiling, putting a hand on Christian's forearm. Christian eyes him with a certain degree of incredulousness.

"How the hell did you just appear right there?"

Felix raises an eyebrow. "What do you mean 'just appear right there'?"

Christian puts his hands on Felix's shoulders and shakes him gently. From the corner of his eye he can see his grandmother leaving the water, walking back to her beach chair further east. "You know what I mean! I can't find you anywhere, can't see you at all and then suddenly you're just here!"

Felix looks at him as if he'd just asked him what two plus two was. "I swam?"

Christian thinks about it for a second and a half, decides that that is implausible, but that the options are limited. His hands are still on Felix's shoulders, and he can feel some heat flushing his face. It's a feeling he's gotten used to the past week, something he can luckily pass off as a by product of the summer sun. "Don't do that ever again. I care about you too much to let you worry me like that."

He knows he sounds like his grandparents, but it's heartfelt, and Felix breaks into a slow, happy smile. He makes eye contact with Christian for a moment, then Christian can see Felix's eyes roam around the rest of his face. He's still grinning a small, steady smile.

Everything seems to happen in slow motion. Felix pulls Christian in for what he thinks is a tight hug and what the brunet thinks is a kiss. Christian can feel Felix's hair graze his mouth before he could even lean in all the way, and they end up hugging in what is quite possibly the most satisfying embrace of Christian's hugging career (he was still a little disappointed though).

"Yeah?" Felix says, hands still all over Christian. The blonde scans the ocean for anything or anyone, sees no one, and tugs on Christian's arm. He leads them in the opposite direction from Christian's grandmother, past the beach house that belonged to Auba and Marco (who they could see hanging up towels on their balcony) and all the way to the gigantic driftwood tree.

Seaweed and old vines cling to the trunk and branches of the tree, providing a little shade. The tide had come up a bit, lapping the underneath of the tree, keeping Felix and Christian slightly wet as they sat in the cool shadow of the tree. Felix faces Christian, who's back was to the ocean. The roar of waves and whirl of the wind are still audible, but Christian was paying attention to neither.

In the privacy of the shade of the driftwood tree, Felix scanned the coastline. Still, no one. Christian's face was a mixture of curiosity, concern and a calm happiness, still leaning close to his friend. Felix has a smile playing on his face as he scoots closer, hand clamped somewhat tight on Christian's bicep. He pulls him in, and tilts his head.

It's both not at all what Christian had expected and all that he'd thought about, even though it made him sound like a cheesy bastard. He'd seen this scene play out in his head far more than once, but it was different in real life. In his mind they'd both be fantastic kissers, making out by the ocean in the most cinematic of ways. In real life, neither of them had any idea of what they were doing, with all of Christian's experience being kissing a girl at a party behind a house once. Felix seems to have the same non amount of experience and looks more than sheepish when they separate.

"I'm sorry," he says, looking down at his legs, sitting crisscross.

"No!" Christian says all too quickly. Felix's head pops up and he raises a brow. "I like you like that, really."

Felix looks kinda like he smelled something bad, but Christian remembers that that was his thinking face. "I know that. I'm sorry 'cos I'm bad at kissing."

Christian is beside himself for a minute. "Oh."

It's awkward for a long while, Felix and Christian sitting quietly with their backs pressed up against the tree and aimlessly throwing shells further out into the water. The tide is slowly rising, slowly covering more of their legs.

"I'm bad at kissing too, I think." Christian eventually says.

Felix nods, and opens his mouth to say something, but his stomach rumbles loudly. Christian takes this as a cue to stand up. "Wanna get lunch? My grandma has ramen?"

Things weren't too much different after the day had passed. Felix and Christian still hung out every day, still surfed and walked around and enjoyed the beach, just with the added bonus of being "more than bros" (coined by no one other than Felix). It was nice, this added intimacy, and the extra thrill of tip toeing around adults like the grandparents or Auba and Marco.

The ocean only seemed to get wilder as the days went on, sometimes enough to keep Christian anxiously standing on the shore while Felix darted further ahead. Not even the blonde could explain the change of events. Obliviously, they carried on with life.

Clouds began to pour in not many days later, heavy dark storm clouds that hung over the raging sea and hung over the beach houses ominously. Felix, placing his shoes under a heavy piece of driftwood like how he did every morning, frowned and hunched down. The wind tugged at his shirt and ruffled his hair. Christian stayed standing, watching as the clouds began to float in over the gulf.

"What do you think is going on?" Felix asks, frowning as he stayed low to the ground. Christian scanned the coastline with his eyes, looking for anyone familiar.

"No idea. Should we go back up to my place?"

Felix pouts gently, even though Christian's attention was still elsewhere. "We did that yesterday for, like, forever. I like making out with you and all, but I think your grandparents are gonna catch on."

Christian ruffles Felix's hair before pulling the other teen up to his feet. There wasn't much to do but watch the dark clouds begin to loom over the landscape. "We should probably ask someone about what's going on. Maybe there's a storm coming."

Felix chuckles, but makes his way over the bar of fluffy, dry sand. "No shit, there's a storm coming," he pauses, spies their blonde neighbor many yards down the coastline. "yeah, we should find someone though."

They make their way towards Marco, who stood up to mid calf in the ocean. His partner, the sunnier black man was nowhere to be seen, and both the adult and the aura around seemed far less bright. His eyes were cast forward at the water before him, his mouth moving in quiet, quiet conversation. His palms faced the sky, and shook so slightly, almost like he was praying.

Felix and Christian weren't sure if they should approach Marco. They'd talked to the man a multitude of times, but almost always with Auba, and never when the man was acting like this. Slowly, they inched towards him, as if he'd strike at them anytime. The wind was stronger as they got nearer to him, whirling around his lean torso.

Marco seems to hear them when they are only a yard or two away, eyes snapping up and open, mouth closing in a firm expression. He looks at them with the most unhappiness they've ever seen on his face, and his arms drop to his sides.

"What's going on?" Christian asks in the smallest of voices.

Marco does not respond immediately, instead thinking for a moment or two. When he does speak, the distant unamericanness of his voice is far stronger. His accent isn't german, but is close to, sounding like he was from somewhere far away. "I'd be careful if I were you. Nothing good is happening out there."

Felix cocks his head to the side like he doesn't get it. Marco doesn't seem happy with it, but Marco doesn't seem happy in general. "Care to elaborate? Storm coming?"

Marco's features have a certain hardness to him. His mouth is set grimly. "I think you know, Felix. Don't play so naive when everyone knows who you are."

Felix and Christian both exclaim their own questions in unison, their words tangling up. Marco has already turned though, beginning his trek back to where he lived. Water sloughed off his legs, wetting the ground beneath him. As he leaves, Christian and Felix turn to face each other.

Christian mouths "what's his problem?" in fear of Marco actually hearing him if he spoke. Felix shrugs. He follows that up with a softly spoken question to Felix about what Marco had said to the blonde. Felix responds with extra shrugging.

"You going out into the water?" He asks Christian, already ankles deep in the surf. Felix's head is turned back slightly to see Christian, golden sunlight breaking from between the clouds for mere moments to illuminate the features on his face.

Christian is already wading out into the water when he says "Have you seen what it's like out there? I wouldn't."

Felix rolls his eyes and grabs Christian's arm, making him hurry up. "Okay, if you're scared of a few big waves, I'll hold your hand."

Christian giggles like a schoolgirl, but lets Felix take his hand. Their fingers interlace, palms touching, and the sea spray is already hitting his face. "This is pretty gay."

Felix whips his head back again to face Christian. The expression on his face is knowing and speaks a lot more than anything he could say. Before he could actually open his mouth a massive wave slams them to the ground. Christian can feel Felix's weight in top of him and the sand sliding underneath and the pull of the current. Their foreheads press together, whether that be because of the sheer force of the ocean or because Felix was doing it on purpose.

For a moment he thinks he's drowning, because the current is almost for sure pulling him out, and the sand is falling down beneath him, opening up in some massive chasm, and then he realizes that he's actually drowning. Christian can remember how at the start of the summer this almost happened, but he won't open his mouth to let the water in. He paddles upwards, towards the surface, but a new current, one from the large pit beneath him begins to pull him down. I thought currents didn't work like this, Christian thinks, his throat starting to burn with the lack of oxygen.

Felix is beside him once more, a firm presence next to him, and then he feels something tickle his face. A bubble of air meets him, and finally he can breath again, heaving heavy as he uses up the air in it. There's still a current pulling him down into the dark hole beneath his feet, but with new air in his lungs and Felix helping tug him up, he is freed from it.

They break the surface, Christian taking greedy gulps of air. Felix doesn't seem suffocated at all, chest not heaving like the brunet's. Instead, he lets Christian put hands on his shoulders as he treaded water just above the pull of the current. Slowly, and still tangled up in each other, they swam to shore.

Lying on the ground with his eyes half closed, Christian turned to Felix. "What the fuck was that?"

Felix shrugs.

Now the brunet shoots into a sitting position, glaring down at Felix. "You can't just shrug at that. It's not like every fucking day the pit to hell opens up in shallow water and threatens to suck you in. That was unnatural!"

Felix tilts his head from side to side, still lackadaisical. "Do you think I have an answer?"

Christian is already walking back to the beach houses. "Yeah, well usually you do when comes to stuff like the beach."

Felix sighs heavily, pushing himself to his feet slowly and beginning to follow Christian. Before he's too far away from the surf he turns his head to look back at the sea. He narrows his eyes, looking at the spot in the water where it was far deeper. The hole was already closing up. He mutters a few choice words under his breath and hurries up to follow Christian.

Too spooked to go back to the ocean, they end up going to the grocery store again. This time it is Christian driving, slowly piloting his grandmother's Subaru. Felix flips through the radio stations as rain pounds the windows of the car.

"I can't believe we're going to a fucking HEB as entertainment, Christian." Felix drawls, looking over the grocery list they had been given.

Christian does not peel his eyes from the road. "You see anything else to do in the entire county?"

"Fair enough."

Felix, despite his complaints during the car ride, remains relatively sunshiny throughout the store trip. He forces Christian to race him in shopping carts in the mostly empty parking lot, rain starting to fall down in sheets. They're completely soaked by the time they actually make it into the store, the grocery list written for them in pen now just a collection of smudges.

Felix (un)helpfully gives Christian reminders of what they needed, all of which being incorrect or horribly mistimed. He lets Christian put his arm around him again though, the togetherness of it all making up for whatever annoyances he causes.

When Christian was little, imagining himself as a teenager usually consisted of campy high school movies, where he'd be the jock surrounded by pretty girls and high status symbols. He didn't ever picture himself introducing Felix as his boyfriend to people in the grocery store that he'd finally started recognizing. It was a whole different kind of nice, but one that he could accept.

"So... uh, this is Felix?" Ousmane says when he runs into them in the cereal isle. Felix nods, trying to slip a box of Froot Loops into the cart.

Christian nods, and takes the box of Froot Loops out of the cart. Ousmane nods back slowly. "And y'all are..?"

Felix puts the cereal box back into the cart. "Dating." He flashes a row of pearly whites at Ousmane. "But we should hang some time, yeah?"

Felix manages to get Ousmane's home phone's number, all while shaming Christian for not writing it down earlier. He stops talking about the other teen once they get into the car, bags full of groceries in the back of the car.

"So we're dating?"

Christian looks at him oddly. "You said that yourself."

Felix has a smile playing on his face. "You started it though."

Christian can't really come up with a response fast enough, so instead he pulls Felix in and kisses him in the parking lot of a rural grocery store in the rain. It's kind of uncomfortable with the seat belts digging into their chests and and the limited space, and Felix laughs when they pull away.

They act like nothing's happened when they come back to Christian's grandparents' beach house, just politely play cards with them. Felix is a favorite of theirs, and they suspect absolutely nothing when the two creep up to Christian's room upstairs. The door doesn't lock but if they put a door to it just right it won't open. Christian plays a cassette tape loud enough to cover up any suspicious noise, though Felix refuses to make out with him to wonderwall (or any of oasis's other greatest hits).

That night he eats dinner with the family, answers their questions under the guise of a best friend and laughs at all the right times. Christian could imagine inviting him over to his parents, and how he'd fit right in with them, and how wonderful it'd be to see him during the rest of the year and

Felix's attention is momentarily swayed from him to the sea raging noisily in the window. The sun, behind thick blankets of clouds, is setting, and Felix looks positively nervous.

"I, uh," Felix says, looking at the adults at the table nervously. "I have to go."

He pretty much bolts after that, sprinting down the stairs and through the yard, up the hill and down to the beach, where he continues to run home. If Christian had payed a little more attention in the last few seconds he would have seen Felix not continue to dart down the coastline, but turn and begin to run into the ocean. Tall waves swept around him as he dove into the sea.

Things were perfectly peaceful for the rest of July and into August, until the days that marked the end of summer break were swiftly arriving. Christian was slowly amassing a hefty collection of Polaroids of their stay, Felix keeping a few of his own. Occasionally Ousmane or Emre appeared in them, but the majority were of Felix, the beach, or Christian and Felix together.

As the final week approached, Christian and Felix found themselves hanging out more often than not. Felix oftentimes slept over, or even showed up for breakfast, seemed to sense the time running out without Christian telling him.

They walked to the museum that was near the beach on one of the last days, quiet and hand in hand. A certain sadness hung in the air, even though the sun was out and the sea was calm and they were telling jokes. The museum of Texan ocean history and science was a tiny little thing, the type of place that got so few visitors that you had to wonder how it stayed open. It was pretty though, when the sun glinted through windows to glimmer on walls painted to look like the sea.

They stay quiet as Felix hovers a tanned hand over a fish tank, the little minnows attentive to him as if he were leading them like a sergeant. Christian finds himself smiling melancholically.

"I know you're leaving soon." Felix says, still looking down at the fish. His voice is positively tiny.

"Yeah," Christian breaths. He feels like his voice was going to crack. "I don't wanna, though."

Felix's hand dips into the water, swirling lazily. It makes a little tornado, fish swimming away from it in fear. "I'll see you next summer, right?"

"Of course. Hopefully before that. I'll go back here as soon as I can, okay?"

Felix's eyes finally dart up to meet Christian's. If he looks hard enough, he thinks he can see he ocean in them. "Yeah," he pauses, breaths deep. "I wish I could visit you up there."

For some reason Christian knows that Felix can't leave. "I know. I'll write you, okay?"

Felix is at his side for the rest of the week, even with the impending doom of the school year starting hanging above their heads. They paddle out into the water together, sometimes going far out enough to where they can't see the shore. Felix and Christian would rest on their backs then, quietly floating in the blue water, staring up at the sky.

The night before Christian leaves the sky a lavender, turning his arms a little purple as he walks his way out into the coast. Felix is there, face a mixture of happiness and dread. They walk together holding hands, feet splashing in the water. As darkness falls, it feels like time has finally ran out.

When Felix kisses him goodbye he thinks he has a good idea of what Cinderella felt like at midnight.

It isn't a real goodbye though-- he comes back in the morning to do it all for real. Christian's parents meet him for all of fifteen minutes, then go back to packing things into the car. Felix shifts from foot to foot uncomfortably, eyes downcast.

"I wanted you to have this." He says, pressing a cassette tape into Christian's hands. There's a little shell on a string loop wrapped around it, one that Christian winds off of it, then looks back to Felix.

The blonde tugs slightly at the one that he'd always worn around his neck, then watched expectantly as Christian put his on. "Thanks, Felix," Christian pauses, hand on Felix's arm. "It means a lot."

Felix grins, then looking about for any adults, pulls Christian into a kiss. It's all he can think about on the long drive back home, already beginning to formulate a letter for Felix in his mind as he listens to the cassette.

\----

June 5th, 2030

Christian smiled, parking the car in the beach house. His parents had moved into the old family one not too long ago, now grandparents themselves. He watched his two daughters hop out of the minivan excitedly, one sixteen and the other twelve.

"Well," he breaths deeply, breaking into a grin. His wife smiles back, holding tightly onto her sunhat in the wind. "We're here. Brings back memories."

His daughters love it at this beach, one that is still quiet and mostly devoid of people. The fishing is good and the sun is bright, and sometimes if he stands just right in the water, he feels like he's the same seventeen year old boy.

Not even three days into the trip, his daughters are blabbing up a storm about the other people they've seen at the beach. For one, there's a gay couple that are "literally the most stylish people ever, you have to meet them dad, especially the the tall one, his last name is so cool" which is followed by the two of them butchering the last name Aubameyang.

More interestingly though, his younger daughter mentions a boy about her age that they met. The elder one tries to brush it off, blushing and attempting to change the subject.

"Daddy, she called him a dreamboat." His younger daughter said with all of the seriousness of a naive twelve year old.

His wife laughs. "Okay now. Care to describe him?"

She nods. "About dad's height, blonde hair, blue eyes, seventeen, weird face."

"Oh my god, Felix's face isn't weird!" The elder one snaps, glaring at the twelve year old. She shows a photo on her phone to Christian and their mother for additional proof. Christian's parents cackle through the entire encounter.

Christian nearly drops the phone into his glass of water. He excuses himself from the table, walks back up to the guest room. He can feel his hands shake like crazy, but this was not something that was supposed to happen.

Slowly, he finds the familiar photo in the family scrapbook. The image from his daughter's phone is sealed into his goddamned retinas, but even if it weren't he'd know that it was the same person in the photo. He stares at the scrapbook until his eyes hurt, and things seem to fall into place.

The next night, he walks out to the beach. If he's particularly quiet he can hear the tracks on the cassette tape Felix had made for him thirty years ago. It's been a long while, he knows. He's no longer young. His hair is greying and there's wrinkles around his eyes, but he knows his smile is still the same when Felix approaches him.

The son of the sea looks exactly the same. Tan and sandy blonde and smiling with a sense of hurt in his eyes that bring Christian back to being seventeen and in a little too deep. There's something a little off about this.

"I'm sorry." Christian says, though he's not sure what he's apologizing for. Felix nods, a glum look on his face.

"It's not your fault." Felix finally responds, voice raspy and near choking up. If there are tears in the corners of his eyes they're there for only a moment.

**Author's Note:**

> This ended up way sadder than I intended it to be? I also did not edit this at all haha so like I'm expecting about fifty thousand errors woo boy. 
> 
> To clear up some plot points  
> Marco is the god Moccus, who's basically the Germanic version of mercury.   
> Auba is the Nigerian sun god Anyanwu. I tried so hard to find a Gabonese god but my research was absolutely fruitless and this guy's name was a little bit like Aubameyang so I settled for it.   
> Felix is the son of Poseidon, God of the ocean. Poseidon is an asshole who cockblocks his kid
> 
> I really hope you enjoyed it! Tell me what you think in the comments.


End file.
